Andy Waldock

About the Author

Andy Waldock, owner of the brokerage firm Commodity & Derivative Advisors and the subscription service COTSignals.com, is a third generation commodity trader with over 25 years of experience on all of the main U.S. exchanges. Andy stays abreast of modern programming developments due to the trading programs he employs for his own account and managed money. He can be reached at www.andywaldock.com.

Crude oil and coffee set commercial trader net position records in November. WTI crude oil set records in both net and total position sizes. The WTI market has remained under $60 per barrel since November of 2015. May of 2016 saw the Baker Hughes rig count bottom at 318. There were nearly 1,500 rigs up and running in Q4 of 2015 when oil prices began falling precipitously. Currently, about 750 rigs are operating. This metric has been steady since early May of 2017.

Speculators are approaching the new year with an eye toward stock market gains and a tightening Federal Reserve. This is a tough combination for interest rate futures to rally against. However, commercial traders are holding their most bullish position since last April.

Soybeans have spiked as much as 15% higher over the last three weeks. So far, the commercial traders’ actions have accurately forecasted this year’s market behavior. In fact, it was commercial processor buying that triggered the discretionary COT buy signal we published for June 28th’s trading.